Pedestrians walk on Main Street in downtown Salt Lake City Tuesday, May 7, 2013.

As part of an ongoing series on “The Next Economy,” the National Journal recently explored Salt Lake City’s reputation as an economic environment with above-average upward mobility.

According to a 2013 study by economists from both Harvard and the University of California (Berkeley), “Salt Lake City shared the admirable distinction (of above average upward mobility) with major coastal cities such as San Diego, San Francisco, Seattle, Washington, D.C., New York and Boston,” National Journal’s Nancy Cook wrote.

But the study that Cook cites was conducted based on factors informed largely by the city's culture and economy of the 1980s and 1990s. A lot has changed since then, Cook points out. The challenge will be how a city such as Salt Lake, with its largely culturally homogenous past, can economically adapt to a rapid increase of diversity.